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Lesser restoration dispels any magical effects reducing one of the subject's ability scores or cures 1d4 points of temporary ability damage to one of the subject's ability scores. It also eliminates any fatigue suffered by the character, and improves an exhausted condition to fatigued. It does not restore permanent ability drain.
With Rivani's spell complete, she packs up here divining stones, shakes her head, and looks up. "Well, the spirits are particularly quiet today. I have no answer as to whether it is safe for Erasmus to continue without rest. Do any of you have potions of lesser restoration yourselves? I do recall Erasmus noting that he is prepared for anything"
Two potions, then follow the young woman up the stairs (or explore the first floor...I can't remember what the consensus was).
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Yoon screws up her face in disgust as the portly man scoops his eyeball out of his head, and quickly follows it with amazement when the eyeball doesn't appear to actually be missing from his head.
yelch, I hope he doesn't do that again, she thinks with a shudder.
"Should we go into this room here?" she says, pointing at the door to the east after coming back downstairs.
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"Perhaps a little preparation would be in order."
Rivani casts Mage Armor and Shield on herself.
"Ok, I believe I am ready now. Though, I am not sure that if this place is completely full of haunts that this will have helped. On the other hand, my abilities are not ideally suited for such things, either."
Honaire floats into the eastern room. He quickly motions the others to follow.
As they enter, they see Two long, low dining tables run parallel in the center of this room, surrounded by the tattered remains of seating mats. Iron lanterns hang from the ceiling but are dark now. The stench of death is particularly cloying under the lanterns.
But their attention is quickly drawn to the corpse of a man hanging suspended from a lantern in the center of the room. The body is not ancient, but there is a mummified quality to it.
exsanguinated
As the Pathfinders approach the body, the hear loud crunching noises. Looking at the bottom of their boots, they can see the remaining chitten from swarms of dead flies.
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Yoon once again screws up her face in disgust, a look that is quickly becoming common lately.
"He must have been here a while... why would he do that? Something truly awful must have happened..."
Yoon starts looking around the room for other clues, using the knowledge of what she saw as they came into the house to look for something else that fits that strange puzzle piece.
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"Honaire, would you kindly remove the poor man? This place seems to be rather... unholy... as it were. I shudder to think of what caused this poor man to hang himself. But, I am tasked to learn, so learn I shall."
Rivani casts detect psychic significance followed by detect magic if that fails to uncover anything.
Lesser restoration ... improves an exhausted condition to fatigued. It does not restore permanent ability drain.
"Alors, we bought these for a reason, right?" the fat Varisian says suddenly. Mavaro pulls out one of the scrolls of detect undead and reads from it. As the spell takes effect, he begins to concentrate first on this room, and then move the cone of detection to walls in order to check the surrounding rooms.
Damned if I let that woman find anything that I cannot!
"..."
Oh, shut up. You weren't exactly short on pride yourself.
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Before Honaire removes the corpse, Estra steps closer to the dead man, squinting her eyes as she inspects him. Shrugging, she nods to her ectoplasmic partner, who proceeds to dutifully disengage the corpse from its tether and carry it outside the front door, the old woman staying near him the whole time.
Both Rivani and Mavaro draw upon their reserve of mystical energies.
Rivani notices nothing unusual in the room.
Mavaro, after 1 round of concentrating, detects no undead in the room.
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From behind the others, Erasmus leans against the doorsill, his breath still labored and seeming to barely able to collect short, ragged sips of air. He looks on the verge of stark panic, his wild eyes seeming alight with restrained fear, as he beholds the form of the man dangling from the lantern. Slowly his eyes trace down the coil tethering the poor soul, and further down across his pitiful body, coming to rest on the bed of flies.
Turning for a moment to his side, he looks for a moment at the empty space beside him, then nods before turning back to the others.
"The man has only been here a few weeks," he beings, suppressing the urge to cough and release some torrent of sickness at the sight before them. "It looks as though he was drained of blood..."
"Exsanguinated..." he finishes quietly.
"Nothing suspicious in this room," Mavaro thoughtfully strokes his now bare chin, "Mais, un moment, I will check the neighboring rooms."
Mavaro continues to scan through the walls for the presence of the undead.
Mavaro continues to concentrate on his spell. His companions, on edge from the dead man in the center of the room, stare at him.
Mavaro begins to move in circles, directing his probe in different directions. Spinning slowly, he discerns that there are undead. Although he cannot determine an exact location, he can determine that there are 'above him' and 'not in this room'.
He is not 100% sure, but he believes that is more than 1.
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I hope I can burn them...
Yoon brings her hands up towards her mouth, chewing on the side of her tunic in a subconscious reaction to the unnatural things unfolding around her.
"Before my mommy died, she taught me that I should just face my fears. I.. I.. I.. I don't wanna just stand down here and wait for something to happen. Let's go find whatever is here."
and burn it.
"Alors!" cries Mavaro, "This room is safe from the undead, as are the ones adjacent... but the one above us contains the unquiet dead, les morts-vivants. My third eye above should let us know if anything comes down, but I say we conclude our business downstairs with haste and face this menace as quickly as we can. D'accord?"
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"No blood, you say?" The woman asks Erasmus with mild interest, giving the corpse another curious glance before Honaire disposes of it.
After waiting for Mavaro to scout and hearing his summation, the woman directs her ectoplasmic counterpart to the forefront, determined to do as Mavaro seemed to be suggesting and hurry around while her protective magics were still in place.
"Exsanguinated? Well, I've certainly have read enough penny dreadfuls to have a guess what could have caused it"
Meligaster shivers, and draws his hidden sword from the cane. Although he wonders if the small blade will do much good against the horrors of this house. But reluctantly the halfling gets into formation, and follows Mavaro to the next room.
BTW, couldn't Honaire take the incorporal form, making him quite efficient scout?
"Might as well try this one, pourquoi pas, eh?" notes Mavaro, striding up to the northern door. He listens at the frame for a while before nodding to Honaire, "I already checked it for les morts vivants, so at least we won't be meeting any haunts or zombies. Care to step through and check it out, my incorporeal friend?"
Mavaro considers chatting to Mother Wren once more, but instead elects to draw his longsword. "No undead, but one can never be too careful, non?" he offers by way of explanation.
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"Wait... shouldn't we cut him down? After all, is would be dreadful to leave him hanging here. Who would do such a thing?" She then has a vision of a wayang running out of a room in terror, where a halfling man missing all of the fingers of his left hand hangs, swaying.
"Estra, would you have your husband cut him down, please? It only seems right. We can arrange a proper funeral later."
She then uses detect magic, checking out the corpse, then the rest of the room.
Before Honaire removes the corpse, Estra steps closer to the dead man, squinting her eyes as she inspects him. Shrugging, she nods to her ectoplasmic partner, who proceeds to dutifully disengage the corpse from its tether and carry it outside the front door, the old woman staying near him the whole time.
Closing her eyes, Rivani spells rolls off her lips. She looks around expectantly for signs that magic is present in the room. Unfortunately, nothing indicates anything is magical.
The eastern portion of this L-shaped room has a raised floor where a finely crafted wooden chair—almost a throne—sits. A half-dozen faded woven mats litter the floor. A small low table—another fine piece of furniture—rests tipped on its side. Scattered on the floor are the broken remains of a porcelain tea set. On the walls hang empty racks where commemorative weapons used to hang in places of honor. Scratched in the western wall is the word 'Liars'.
Mavaro seats himself upon the throne, and pulls out his half-skull. He sinks into the chair, running his hands over every groove and concentrating deeply, trying to pick up some kind of psychic impression.
"Well, at least it's comfortable," says Mavaro, apparently talking to the skull once again.
"..."
"No, I do not think I have sat on too many comfortable chairs already. Let me concentrate, woman," he snaps back.
Mavaro, sitting in the plush chair, suddenly tenses. He grips the armrest, his knuckles whitening. His back stiffens like a board, and his eyes roll back, exposing the whites to all around him.
The Way of the Kirin once held formal meetings in this
room. The fine chair on the raised floor was reserved for
the ranking member of the organization
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"Interesting.... The waitress from the bar owns this chair, and she is very happy. Or was. This seems a little... odd... Oh, and did you all recall that the victims of the house,my hose few that were found, were also drained of blood?" she adds, looking back at the corpse of the man they found
"I wonder if that waitress woman knows anything..."
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Estra listens to Mavaro talking to his skull, then turns to Honaire and shakes her head. She suspected that half the people around her were quite mad. Upon hearing Rivani's words, the old woman thinks for a moment, then remarks, "This waitress seems to be a steady motif as we go through this house. She likely knows what we are about, so be careful, in case her intentions are evil."
She pats Honaire on the back soothingly, watching one way while he keeps an eye on the other direction.
Mavara sits bolt upright and whispers, "The Way of the Kirin..."
"How do you know the waitress owns this chair?" Mavaro asks, curious, before continuing self-importantly, "I have seen a vision of what happened here. An organization known as 'the Way of the Kirin' used to meet here, and I believe that it is being resurrected. The woman on this chair was setting herself up as the leader. Alors, who knows anything about this 'Way of the Kirin'?"
Mavaro checks his own memory for anything about these people.
common people and to opposing political corruption.
20+ When the empire of Lung Wa fell a century
ago, there was a strong backlash against the Way of the
Kirin, and the exploitation and corruption the Way had
held at bay ran rampant throughout the Successor States.
Hinojai remained a bastion of the Way’s ideals, since
it was safely in Minkai, but without the power of her
network to support her, Minasako’s influence in the area
began to wane.
25+ After 1 or 2 years, Minasako could represent
the Way in name only, as she no longer had any means to
enforce its doctrines. The Hinojai manor eventually fell into disrepair and Minasako disappeared, but no body was
ever found.
Minasako=waitress
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"Our venture captain said this group might be an ally to the pathfinders, their ideals sound like the right thing. Was this group mercilessly cut down in this house? Maybe that is why there is so much torment here..."
-Posted with Wayfinder
"Peu être, but perhaps those here were interested in perverting the Way of the Kirin," muses Mavaro, "But I'm not sure. The woman sitting on this seat was indeed the same woman ordering the killings that we saw when the haunt outside. Whatever connection this room has to the Way, the woman who sat here was certainement mauvais, most assuredly evil." Mavaro unusually translates part of his speech for the benefit of the non Varisian-speakers.
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"Well, as we know, she was under duress, so perhaps in the long, long ago, she felt trapped, and did some heinous things to try and survive. What we might be seeing now is the perversion of her acts, and the cost of doing evil, even if in the name of good. Hmm... perhaps it is true that evil only begets evil... that doing evil to protect good is still evil. Interesting philosophical question..."
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"Your philosophizing reminds me of a m'sieur from Galt," muses Mavaro, "But then he developed an unhealthy obsession with his mother, lead a revolution, took over and was cut down by the next philosophical revolutionaries. So, what the f*ck does he know, eh?"
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"Honestly, Mavaro, one needn't be so crude. One has to admit, however, that this is an interesting tale, and an interesting dilemma. In fact, one might argue that your Galtan friend learned this very lesson... or a similar one."
She considers trying to read the aura on the chair, to see what alignment it might be, but decides that they should continue moving. She moves over to door #2, looking at it, trying to decide what to do. "Perhaps we should keep moving? I believe there is much to be learned here."
"Hey, why the second-guessing? If we want to know the old hag's involvement in this, why don't we go and ask her. If we want to be subtle, you can do your mind-poking thing on her. If we don't care for such subtleness, I can just make her talk. And I'd be happy to!"
"But that would mean walking back to that sad excuse for a village... So while we're here, let's search the place. Mavaro, move your Varisian arse to the next door, chop chop!"
Mavaro rushes into the next room, ready to kill or be killed, his story written in the annals of history.
Instead he finds two empty bathtubs and a rotting bench. Paintings of cherry blossoms decorate the walls.
you see this with your SOP
"Well, I have no desire to get an object reading from that tub!" Mavaro declares, "If there is nothing more of significance here, shall we move on to the next room? Ouis? Honaire, if you would, s'il vous plaît."
While the spirit moves into position, Mavaro checks around the room to ensure that there is indeed 'nothing more'.
"Well, the undead detection spell I cast would have extended into these rooms," says Mavaro, eying the door suspiciously, "So I guess these are free of such infestation also. Let's try the door on the left first, unless there are any objections..."
Mavaro hefts his blade and waits for Honaire to open the door and spring whatever traps lay beyond.